


What Difference Does it Make?

by EldritchMoose



Series: This Charming Man [2]
Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Hux being a jerk because he can, M/M, past relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-03
Updated: 2016-02-03
Packaged: 2018-05-18 00:35:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5891200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EldritchMoose/pseuds/EldritchMoose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kylo Ren recuperates from his injuries on Moraband and General Hux finds an old secret from his past to taunt him with.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What Difference Does it Make?

Moraband, the ancient Sith homeworld, had gone by many names and served many purposes. For now, it was the retreat of Supreme Leader Snoke and his pupil, Kylo Ren. General Hux chafed under the orders that kept him bound to the place. The galaxy was on fire and he should have been out there, bringing order to the chaos that the First Order was slipping into and spreading that order to a galaxy lacking the entirety of its leadership. Instead, he was trapped on a desolate and cold planet which had been ravaged by forgotten wars and haunted by the echoes in the Force left by failed Sith Lords. He hated every moment of it. The only thing that made it remotely bearable was the knowledge that Ren was just as miserable.

Hux had never been one to let the fuel of hatred go to waste, no matter how petty a project he devoted it to. He didn't have the Force, but he did have his mind and access to all of the First Order's databases and resources. Late one night when he had been forced to listen to Ren shrieking in agony for the thousandth time during the latest "teaching exercise" Snoke had developed, he stumbled across something truly fascinating. The Knights of Ren had preserved the computer records from Skywalker's New Jedi Temple. He laughed to himself, picturing vids of Kylo as an awkward teen. 

"Please, by the Force and all the gods, let there be at least one of Skywalker scolding him. It would make all of this worth it," Hux said to himself, a malicious smirk crossing his face.

There was footage of various classes and training exercises, but nothing terribly interesting. Hux grudgingly admitted to himself that Kylo actually had looked like he knew what he was doing in his classes. He finished sorting through the official parts of the archives and moved into the personal files. Most of it was dull, interesting only to long dead children, but then Hux stumbled across the jackpot. Kylo Ren's, or rather Ben _Solo's_ , personal files. Most of it was fairly uninteresting, but there was a collection of vids and text messages that made Hux's eyes go wide.

"Oh, this is perfect."

Kylo Ren sat in troubled silence in his quarters. He had intended to focus his attention on accelerating with the Force the healing of the injuries gained from the day's training, but instead he stared at the helmet that had once belonged to his grandfather. There was no reassurance to be had from it, no whispers from deep within the Force to ease the pain he felt. If his grandfather had ever reached out from the grave to connect with him, he seemed to have lost interest. The only voices he had heard in his mind in months had belonged to Snoke and Leia Organa. Somehow her anguish when he cut down her husband had given her the strength to briefly push through barriers he had erected specifically to keep her out. Her grief-stricken cry of a long-dead boy's name still haunted him; he did everything in his power to hide that from Snoke.

A presence Kylo had learned to despise with a hatred he had previously reserved only for the family of a dead boy caught his attention as it came closer to his quarters. He slid his helmet back on and strode to the door, opening it just as Hux reached for the chime button.

"Oh, good. You're awake. I was terribly worried I might have to wake you," Hux said in his most insincerely pleasant voice.

"Is this a social call or do you have something important to justify interrupting me?"

"It's quite important, not that you're doing anything essential. Moping in front of your morbid little trophy again? Vader must be so proud." Hux had moved into Kylo's quarters and was setting up a portable holoprojector.

Kylo thought briefly about how pleasant it would be to rip Hux's heart out of his chest with the Force, but restrained himself. Snoke valued the irritating man for reasons Kylo did not grasp and harming him was not the wisest course of action.

"I was searching through our archives and found this. I thought it might bring back memories of more pleasant times. You seem like you could use some cheering up."

Hux pressed a button and a hologram flickered to life. It was a vid taken on the grounds of the New Jedi Temple, in a courtyard of some kind. It showed a male teenaged human, tall and lanky, dressed in the robes of a Jedi and waving to the camera. He was at most fourteen, pale-skinned with long black hair. The resemblance between Kylo and the boy was obvious and undeniable.

The voice of the person filming filled the room, "Ben, I flew all the way from Yavin to see you and all I get is a wave? Kriffing Jedi."

"Who might that be talking?" Hux asked. His rhetorical question was laced with enough scorn to power a new Starkiller Base. "Oh, yes. Let's skip ahead and see."

The footage jumped ahead and now the angle of the camera indicated it was hanging from the air, possibly in the grip of the Force. Ben Solo and the footage's previously unseen narrator were standing together, wrapped in a hug. The other boy was shorter despite appearing slightly older. Ben threaded his fingers through the other boy's unruly curls and pulled him up into a kiss that went on long enough that Hux looked slightly uncomfortable watching it.

Finally they broke apart and Ben said, "I've missed you, Poe. I wish you'd come visit more often. My parents haven't been keeping you away, have they?"

Hux paused the vid and turned to face Kylo, a smirk crossing his pale face and twisting it disagreeably. "Imagine that. Ben Solo and Poe Dameron, future "best pilot in the Resistance", in love. It's adorable. And raises some interesting questions about that dashing pilot's escape from the _Finalizer_."

"Are you accusing me of something?" Kylo's voice was steady and devoid of anything approaching emotion. If Hux had hoped to provoke him into an outward display of emotion, he had failed so far.

"I'm just commenting on the curiosity of the coincidence. Are you sure you weren't .... compromised by his presence?"

"If you think that pilot means anything more to me than Han Solo did, perhaps you are the one compromised," Kylo's hand had slipped almost imperceptibly toward the newly-constructed saber on his hip. Hux did not miss the movement and smiled, feeling he had scored a victory, however slight, over his opponent. He slipped the datachip out of the projector and tossed it at Kylo. It bounced off of his chest and dropped to the floor.

"Keep it. Maybe the _happy memories_ will help you sleep."

It took everything in Kylo to refrain from choking Hux as he turned to walk away. Once the door to his room closed, he raised a hand and touched the Force. The datachip levitated into the air and hung in front of him for a long moment. He reached out and plucked it from the invisible grasp, took a half step toward the abandoned holoprojector, and then stopped. His fist clenched and the shards of the datachip fell to the floor.

**Author's Note:**

> I was trying to finish the latest This Charming Man chapter, but I got distracted by a sentence I wrote in a conversation Leia has with Finn and yeah, this happened. *shrugs*


End file.
